Bitcoin Forum

This has been suggested several times (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5136576.msg51024923#msg51024923) and I think it's extremely important. I see it as essential for the forum's funds security and I don't see any disadvantages at all. Current treasurer OgNasty agrees (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5136576.msg50985273#msg50985273) multisig should be used.

I would suggest choosing several very trustworthy users and creating x-in-y addresses, where x is at least 3 (to avoid collusion) and y is at least x+2 (to avoid an accident to lock the funds). 4-in-7 addresses could be a good option. Theymos, is there any reason this hasn't been implemented yet? What are the disadvantages? Funds have been lost and more could be lost in the future.

Local rule:
Vod can't quote or mention OgNasty, directly or indirectly.
OgNasty can't quote or mention Vod, directly or indirectly.

This will be a very good step to secure the forum funds. It has a cost. I know OG gets 0.5BTC meaning more key holders, more money to pay every month.

So, considering the expense, I think 2/3 Multisig wallet/address will more than enough.

Thanks for posting this topic. Someone had to create a topic for this.

I think the current BTC0.5-per-month fee is ridiculously high and having 7 treasurers wouldn't require paying each one a similar fee.
Probably BTC0.02 or BTC0.05 for each one would be more than enough.

In my opinion 2-of-3 isn't enough (but still much better than now of course).

Any x/y combination will be better than the presently the coins are in hold. I have no issue with trusting OG but the risk is the accident. The accidental damage is my concern and I am sure most of the forum members too will have the same statement.

That will be up to theymos in fact everything is up to him. We just want to see the funds are not in any risk :-)

I think it would even be better to peg the fee to the US Dollar rate. From what I can see.. BTC's volatility seem to be back.

You think that 0.1% of the total is not a fair escrow price? What % do you think would be fair than? I see a ton of escrows on here that want between 0.5-1%


I don't even see the point in having fourm treasurers anymore its not like the fourm is sitting on any large amount of btc. It seems like it is all pretty much spent

This is a Bitcoin forum. We are hoping Bitcoin to establish as the main currency of the world. I know this may take few decades if not centuries but I would like to see a world where the main currency will be Bitcoin.

So we better stop compering fiat with Bitcoin :-D

It's a per month expense we are talking about not a year or a term of one time x amount of time.

-- Wait 0.5BTC a month?

How much BTC exactly is he holding? I thought it was somewhere around the 500BTC mark, right?

That's ~0.1% a month (and incrementing each month in % of total.). Seems totally insane to me, or am i missing something?

---
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=155000.0
Cool stuff. That's a decent amount of money for just holding an escrow. I'm guessing it was a lot less at the time, and never got readjusted.

+1

Why does it have to be based on a percentage? Maybe it makes sense for small deals (along with a minimum) but not for higher amounts paying every month.

Based on the treasurer's obligations posted on one the contracts (http://pastebin.com/raw/33E6kJ46), I estimate the treasurer must work not more than a few hours per month, or less.
At BTC0.05 (currently just under $400), that's at least $100 per hour for their work. I think that's more than enough regardless of what percentage of the total represents.

Edit: Actually much fewer hours and therefore much more per hour after checking the number of transactions of the treasure address (https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/1Eog8UqRFLufC71rBLt2nYgfUDskgxAyVF).

But this is not the main point at all.

I don't think it's paid out of the held amount:

https://live.blockcypher.com/btc/address/1Eog8UqRFLufC71rBLt2nYgfUDskgxAyVF/

And we don't know if the amount has been revised since then.

On the other hand, a high fee might make sense for a single holder of funds because of risks and logistical challenges (if they're serious in protecting the funds in case of an accident for example, so that might involve a living will / lawyers / etc). Some of which might not be necessary with multisig so the fee could be lower in that case.

I am not sure there are enough trustworthy people whom it would not be insane to trust with this much money, and to not collude to try to steal the money.

BTC500 to be held by one single person? Definitely not. Not anyone. I think those funds are at risk.
7 people for a 4-of-7 multisig address so 4 signatures are required? Absolutely yes. Much less trust is required in that case.

Back in the days when the tx made the value for this 500BTC was only: $34,445.00 (I hate to compare with fiat damn!),
Now it's: $3,448,708.66
When BTC had it's ATH over $19k (consider $19k) then the value was :  $9,500,000.00
There are no question about OG's loyalty and responsibility. OG really has some really a big balls :-P (<== thanks bud)

Reference: https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/address/1Eog8UqRFLufC71rBLt2nYgfUDskgxAyVF


An imaginary scenario:
2/3 Multisig wallet

Key 1 : theymos
Key 2 : OG
Key 3 : VOD

or

Key 1 : theymos
Key 2 : QS
Key 3 : VOD

:-P

It isn't.  It has historically been paid from separate funds and 1099's issued to ensure payment of the appropriate taxes on income.  The big winner in this situation has always been Uncle Sam.  I think there are better ways to do it, like the way NastyFans issues distributions.  Reclassifying those payments and spreading to more multi-signers would have a multitude of advantages, including for me personally, so it's hard to disagree with.



Hard to disagree with that conclusion as well.  You're welcome.  I was built for this.



LOL.  Pretty sure Vod's chances of being a part of bitcointalk outside of a regular user have evaporated with his recent behavior.

What about:

1: Theymos
2: Ognasty
3: Otoh
4: GP
5: Minerjones
6: BG4
7: Blazed
8: coblee

I think that if the fourm goes to multi sig, that at least 3 or 4 of the people that are picked, individually have more than 500 btc.

If there's going to be a multisig treasurer system, wouldn't it make sense to only pay the treasurers for their services after the funds have been paid back?

Is there an overview of past returns from treasurers? I know one was lost, but I don't know how the others did. I'm curious if it's been worth having treasurers over just Admin keeping the funds.

First of all, this is ultimately theymos' money, legally speaking, so the decision starts and ends with him.

In order for it to be a good idea to allow someone to hold 500BTC of your money, you need to be confident they can be trusted holding said money. This is very straightforward as all you need to ask yourself if the person can be trusted with said amount of money. OgN has shown himself to be able to be trusted with the money -- he has not touched the money, even as its value exceeded $10 million, this is true even if you need to ask probing questions when relying on information provided by him.

If someone were to be a keyholder of a 4-of-7 address, they need to be similarly trusted. They perhaps to not need to have sufficient "trust" -- that is confidence they will keep their promises when amounts involved are in the millions, not having a bunch of ratings for $200 transactions and for having "good judgment" -- to hold 500BTC, but need enough trust to hold very substantial amounts of others' money.

If you were to rely on the fact that two "people" are truly separate people, you will have difficulty verifying this information.  First you need to verify they are two distinct people, but this is difficult because locations can easily be faked. Next you need to evaluate if the various keyholders have existing business or personal relationships that might conflict with the assumption the keyholders will not collude to steal the money. Two people that run a business venture together are going to be similar to being one person as they are likely to be loyal to eachother, and their financial success not only depends on the others' reputation, but also their financial situations are likely to be similar and will depend on how successful their venture is. The same is true if two people later form a venture after becoming a stakeholder. if two people have frequently traded with eachother, or are otherwise friendly, they may not disclose an (unsuccessful) attempt to collude to steal funds as a "joke" or would not otherwise report such an attempt.

The service is to hold the money, potentially for years (as has been the case), and to maintain the private keys holding the coins. Coinbase charges (https://custody.coinbase.com/pricing) 0.5% per year to hold coins similarly to how the treasurers are holding funds. Gemini charges (https://gemini.com/custody-services/#fee-schedule) 0.4%/year. OgN's payment is probably a bit on the high side, but both he and theymos are free to negotiate a price they wish. 

I support the demand of Multisig address . I do not know why it is not in priority list of theymos, specially when previous treasured died and locking the funds of the forum.

I think theymos is not trusting anybody with forum funds except OgNasty.

If theymos thought there was a need to change up the way things have been done, i'm sure it would have been done by now. I'll would almost guarantee that he has the home address and real name of OGNasty in case something like theft were to happen.

I doubt very much he's gonna just send 500 btc to a guy and not have some sort of information on the guy.

OG can just send the BTC to a friend and file a police report for whatever he wants.

Multisig is necessary.

I sure hope so. I'd consider that absolutely required, regardless of whether a multisig address is used, for security, to sign the contract and for tax purposes.
That would also allow to make sure the chosen treasurers are really different people and not related to each other, which worried QS (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5142709.msg51037569#msg51037569).

Whatever security implemented at the moment can be kept and improved. Using a multisig address just adds even more security, nothing needs to be compromised as far as I know or has been exposed here.

I'm actually a little surprised that all of the forums funds are held by a single entity. Not even really a "trust" thing... but more just common sense risk management.

Especially considering funds have already been lost because of a "single point of failure".

When theymos sent me the treasury funds, I had not given him any information about myself whatsoever.  I keep the funds safe because I am an honest person, not out of fear that I couldn't take the BTC.  Read the contract... 

"This is a non-legal agreement between The Bitcoin Forum ("Forum") and OgNasty ("Treasurer"). This agreement is intended to be enforced in a non-violent, non-legal way by the community."

This Libertarian treasury experiment was a leap of faith by theymos, and I am not going to disappoint him.  Don't just take my word for it though.  Watch and see.

I'm glad I was able to help increase security (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5136576.msg51032881#msg51032881).   Still OG, you cannot cheat death, or control the actions of other (truck) drivers.

Also, nothing is stopping you from using those funds to disappear should your lose your house.  :/


We've seen how you respect the community.... :(

Multisig is necessary.

Vod, you really need to get a life. If you think an insignificant weasel like yourself could have an effect on my security practices, you’re more narcissistic than I thought. You’ve turned yourself into a running joke and you’re the only one not in on it.

Didn't you just offer to leave the door unlocked for me?   ::)

If I could vote for someone to be part of the Multisg wallet, I would vote for Will Binns. Choosing someone who is part of these recurring conflicts over Trust would bring more confusion on this subject.

Please note I've added a local rule for this thread, as stated in OP:


Let's stay on topic.
(However this rule applies even for on topic posts)

Well then I want my five merit back.  :(

Seriously though, what is stopping Theymos from doing this?  It is needed now more than ever.  I would expect serious changes in the next month, and that is a lot of money to play with... 

 ???

He could already be getting it set up. It probably takes a decent period of time to choose treasurers and get them all to securely setup wallets. There's nothing stopping him.

I don't think it is quite that easy to set something like this up, especially if going by your suggestion of 7 members.

Firstly theymos would have to find 7 members who can agree with each other that are trusted enough to hold a key to the wallet. Secondly he'd have to make sure these 7 members are not part of either "side" as it would surely cause a riot if it were to turn out that they were.

I do not envy theymos in this decision and could very well see him set this up with Cyrus/Global Mods and OgNasty thus eliminating any and all random elements.

---

EDIT; Added OgNasty as he has proven himself capable of holding funds.

My vote is for Vod, TMAN, & owlcatz to do a 2 of 3 escrow.

Jesus guys, stop acting like a bunch of kindergarteners. You are both making yourselves look like idiots.

On topic: I think everybody agrees that NOT using multi sig is a huge risk. A 2/3 multi sig wallet is sufficient. I think Theymos is perfectly capable of finding a third treasures (assuming he will be one of the sig holders).

Learn something new everyday, I though this had already been established. I'm shocked it wasn't implemented after the issue with the treasurer Parodium paraipan passing away.

With the talk of pegging it to USD, doesn't theymos peg certain payments or rewards to Troy ounces of Gold?  Not that the forum is currently hurting for funds in any way.

Edit: Thanks LoyceV, now I'm one of those death hoax people  :P

It will happen or is already happening.

Thanks for the vote of confidence OG, quite suprised on the turn around as you used to believe that multi-sig is untested and your own set up is much better.

In seriousness yes I am probably a better choice than you, I would be happy to supply my arrest record if you would as well btw. I would not be willing to escrow such an amount with people I class as friends on the forum though, seeing as we hate each other you and I being polar opposites who can’t agree if it’s raining or not would be a good choice for 2 of the keys, although I’m not too sure if you have any experience with multi sig based on your previous stance

My concerns are primarily around possible business relationships. If you would trust the keyholders with being solely in control of 500BTC, having this conflict will not make any difference, however if the conclusion is the person would only be safe to hold much less BTC, my concerns become more relevant.

This seems to have worked well with living treasurers, but not so much when the treasurer dies. I suspect this is in part because a treasurers heirs are not going to care about the community the same way a treasurer will, given a best case scenario, and a more common scenario is that the heirs will make a mistake and sell the treasurers computer equipment holding the private keys

Parodium (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=1162397) is alive and posting, you mean paraipan (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=29395) (see Everything I've found on the missing 250 BTC from Paraipan (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5135232.0)).

Not touching the funds isn't the same as returning them when requested, especially if not touching the funds means a monthly income just for keeping a private key locked up somewhere.
(note: I'm not making any claim about any treasurer's trustworthyness here, I'm just questioning the logic of the system. From what I understand a treasurer's monthly payments would even continue if he lost the private key)

Only one Reason I believe is valid if something happens to Ognasty like Satoshi.

2/3 Multisig is required here.

Theymos
OgNasy
Cyrus

Is this some kind of "test" that OG wants to enact to see if we would scam them, or is he being smarmy here? I'd have no issue doing this, but not for free, and certainly not until any and all doxx info was removed about me from investigations - I'm kind of like you OG. Once you know the general area and a name, it's not hard to find people. ::)

Why is a recurring fee even necessary? Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't turn a fee down if someone offered me it but it doesn't seem like it's essential for doing something that requires no effort once it's been set up. Is OG still being paid 0.5 a month? I know many people like to do things in bitcoin around here but this is why paying things fixed in fiat often makes much more sense, especially if it's a long-term arrangement. It's obviously worked out great for OG but not for the forum and could get much worse.


So you're perfectly fine to do long-term deals in fixed in bitcoin? 0.5 a month was probably mere hundreds when it was initially given. Now it's literally thousands.


Well I think the ultimate confirmation of that would be if/when he sends it back (and not saying he wont). Can't remember the guys name but there was one treasurer who was refusing to send the money back initially because his 'wife' was holding his hard drives to ransom or something because someone had said something "she" didn't like here. Obviously complete bullshit and he was just annoyed but he did return them in the end once he'd calmed down which I'll give him credit for.


Well they could still refuse to send it back if the money was more than they were owed in fees.


I've suggested previously to look for people who already have a very high reputation amongst the community and have a history of holding and returning large amounts of money in the past (people like Dooglus etc). People who are already multimillionaires and have businesses here with reputations to keep are unlikely to run off with money they've been entrusted with. Alternatively and to rule out any shenanigans, maybe it's better for thyemos to just hold the money himself in maybe a safe deposit box and get some sort of legal contract drawn up in case of his death (or whatever) that the money will then be sent to certain trustees or to certain trustees multisig walllets.


He's mentioned in the staff forum that it's a concern. Probably just on his huge list of "to-do's" around here but I guess it should be prioritised. 

Thinking about this as its only holding a single key to a multisig wallet, as long as I agreed with the set up (IE not close friends of mine and not QS,thule or any of the nutters) I would happily hold a key for free - its not as if its hard work sticking it in a safe deposit box with stuff is it, my opsec for that is tight enough. 

This leaves a question for me.

What will be in the fate of this forum if any such thing accidentally happen? Is there anyone else well trained to take over the responsibilities or the forum will be gone with him?

Note: Long live theymos, stay in good health.

It would make sense if it's some sort of insurance fee: in case the forum's funds are lost, the treasurer has to pay for it out of his own pocket.
However, that only makes sense if the treasurer holds enough coins on his own to easily be able to do that. I read the requirement when theymos was looking for treasurers: they had to have handled much more than the amount they would hold for the forum, but that's also at a time it was worth 99% less in dollar.

Isn't a published signed transaction that can't be broadcasted before (say) block 750,000 a nicer solution than a legal contract? That only requires to move the funds every 150,000 blocks or so.

I'm pretty sure the head moderators/oldest staff are well capable of taking over. Bitcointalk shouldn't (and isn't) be dependant on one person.

I was asked a few years ago if I was interested in doing a multi-sig for forum funds by Theymos. I am not sure why it never happened (I was not interested, but there were several people asked IIRC).

I think now is the peak time to fulfill this as we can see the community is more concern than before.

No disrespect to OgNasty, he has done an excellent job and still doing his job silently but these 500btc are a lot of money now. Especially in the bull run it might worth few 10 millions. That will be a hack lot of money. Let's say we trust OgNasty with whatever amount it becomes but no one can guarantee an accident (physical or any kind of) that might not happen. We will leave out without any option.

It's always better to have options in hand. And a multi sign address is better than anything else that we have now.

I am curious to know what's in theymos's mind.

Thank you.

There is no doubt that OG has been doing a good job keeping those BTC safe.
However, he is not immortal and a car crash or anything could end him (hopefully you have a long and happy  life!)

So it is not about the "trust" it is about the "what if" inherent to us living in a world that is safe but not empty of tragedies.

In that case, why not a 1-out-of-2  multisig option with Theymos and OG having a key.

OG is still in charge of the coins as treasurer, the back-up being Theymos also having a key.
Both could spend the coins if needed.

Everybody would be happy, not need to have 7 members like some of you guys said.

Forum bug bounties are already denominated in XAU but...


... the BTC held by OgNasty has also increased in value. There's an argument to be made that the increase in risk isn't collinear with real remuneration as Bitcoin appreciates in value, but if I'm getting things right, the agreement was first drafted in March 2013 when 1 BTC was worth less than $100. $50 a month for keeping $10M (at Bitcoin peak value) with no multisig sounds way too low to me.


CIYAM/Ian Knowles.


Potential treasurers might not care as much to always be around/available and respond within a reasonable time frame if they aren't getting something in exchange. In a scheme involving multiple people, more than one person might start caring less about being available if something takes away their interest from the forum for some time, in the belief that other treasurers are all going to be available.


Multisig can safeguard the money against the treasurer getting hit by a bus, and 1-of-2 multisig is fine for that (bus factor x2 compared to no multisig), but it can also be used to keep money safe in the event that one or more treasurer decides to retire earlier and with more money. The 1-of-2 scheme doubles this risk, so obviously a different one should be employed.

Same goes for the unlikely but possible event that a treasurer gets kidnapped/tortured/extorted. In the cryptoland there have been more than a few instances of violence employed against cryptocurrency owners to get to their money. Also, on this very forum even some of the most trustworthy people have become scammers (or otherwise contributed to the misappropriation of other peoples' money, but if there's a loss, the distinction hardly matters to the victim(s)), and theymos like no one else should be well aware of this fact.

Given the sums involved, a potential for criminal conspiracy between some treasurers is also something to be taken into consideration. All in all, there aren't many highly trusted individuals fit for this long-term arrangement of a job. And among those who are qualified not everyone might be willing to participate. Theymos/the Bitcoin Forum is already out of 250 BTC after paraipan died without leaving a reliable dead-man's switch, so it makes sense to be more cautious when deciding how and to whom the BTC should be sent to for gatekeeping.

e: typo

Done. (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=155000.0) I've been thinking about this for a long time, and I started working on it in earnest last month.

I very much appreciate OgNasty's willingness to perform this high-risk role for years! Returning 500 BTC is a more trustworthy action than most people will ever do.


I came to 1.2% yearly by looking at gold storage companies and commodity ETF/ETN fees. GBTC for example charges 2% per year, plus a significant premium, etc. Some past treasurers were paid about the same rate, BTW -- it wasn't just OgNasty. It should be BTC-denominated, since their risk and responsibility varies with the value of what they're protecting. In a multisig any fee should be split several ways, though, not multiplied.

Nowadays the fee should maybe be a little lower, since the ecosystem is more developed/competitive. But mere hundreds of dollars per year for what OgNasty was doing? Anyone who would accept that is either willing to act as an unpaid volunteer, essentially, or they aren't properly considering the risks.


paraipan was the only loss. Past treasurers John K., Garr255, Ian Knowles, Rassah, Ryland R Taylor-Almanza, and now OgNasty all returned the funds with which they were entrusted.

Fantastic move theymos, thank you.

Wow!
Congrats OgNasty, SaltySpitoon, DarkStar_, and minerjones on your prestigious positions. And good job theymos for your choices! They have all been on my inclusions list..
DarkStar_ is going places..

Especially good job to OgNasty for returning the funds!

Indeed! Returning funds is the real test after many years.

I just read the first contract (https://bitcointalk.org/T19/DarkStar_.txt), and want to highlight a few parts:
Shouldn't this mission be highlighted much more prominent on Bitcointalk?

That's a serious burden to carry as a treasurer, most people won't be able to cover the current value of around 4 million dollars.

Great choice of treausurers, and an excellent move to keep things safe and have contingencies in place.

Never expected anything different from OG myself.

Minerjones has been involved in a number of questionable (at best) escrow transactions.
For example here (http://archive.is/nWFY7#selection-726.64-1113.36) (the original has been edited) of when he very strongly was implying he was holding exactly 1 of 3 keys to a multisig escrow address, and between 10 and ~100 BTC ended up missing (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4895354.msg44582608#msg44582608) after the BCH forked coins were sent to an exchange and it appears (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4895354.msg44672360#msg44672360) even more money may be missing from the conversion of altcoins into bitcoin.

Here (http://archive.is/yDC3k#selection-1645.102-1645.321) is a second example in which it was initially said there would be losses to investors of money the escrow agents should have been holding (I believe in this case the money was eventually recovered from the scammer). In this case I believe minerjones to be one of the escrow agents in the transaction, but I have not immidiately been able to locate a post/signature of his to confirm this. There are posts by others indicating minerjones was acting as one of the escrow agents.

Here (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1476782.0) is an example of general incompetence in regards to securing his own funds.

Dictionary.com defines (https://www.dictionary.com/browse/auction) auction as:

Merriam Webster defines (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/auction) auction as:
Here are six examples in which minerjones did not honor his auction he listed, either because of his own lack of due diligence, or othersise
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2080572.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2056006.0 (the OP is edited to reflect "closed", but the title indicates there previously was an auction)
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2010947.0;all
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2007260.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2096022.msg21103971#msg21103971
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2096012.msg21104171#msg21104171

In the third auction MJ backed out of (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2010947.0;all), it appears the person he was contracting with never owned what was being sold.

The beauty of multisig is that you don't have to trust minerjones completely, you just have to trust the others to not conspire with him.

You're being absurd.

To be entirely fair, there is missing money in at least one escrow transaction in which minerjones was a part of.

I don't think it would make much sense to start out with one of the keyholders who has a history I describe.

Considering that minerjones is statistically the most trusted member of the forum, who has escrowed large amounts of BTC for the forum, I'd say that he is a pretty good pick. Regardless of that though, anyone could have been picked in minerjones' place and it wouldn't have made a difference provided that the other keyholders are trusted enough to not conspire with them to steal the coins.

I'm absolutely sure that theymos did his due diligence before picking the keyholders considering the massive amount of money at stake.

The trust ratings/lists are manipulated through coercion. If the other keyholders are trustworthy enough to not collude with MJ, then theymos might as well allow there to be only 4 keyholders.

There are unfortunately very few people who even come close to being trustworthy enough to be a keyholder. I presume it was not desired for theymos to be one of the keyholders, and he was one probably because of a lack of trustworthy candidates.

Potential replacements for MJ would include, in no particular order:
Dabs
philipma1957
DannyHamilton
TwinWinNerD
qwk (I am not sure if he has held large amounts of others' money)
smoothie
RHavar

There are drawbacks to a number of the above people, inactivity being one of them.

Which has no impact on whether MJ is trusted by the community in large or not, as is shown by the variety of people that left him positive trust ratings.

Which increases the chance of problems to arise should certain keyholders be unable to fulfill their duties.

I can't say that I, or the majority of other community members (probably), would have any issues with any of these users being selected as keyholders along with a few others. One of those others being minerjones, which invalidates the discussion we're having.

As hard as you may try to deny it, minerjones is someone that is trusted at large by the community (bar a few members with questionable histories and motives, such as yourself). As I said, I'm sure that theymos and everyone else involved has done plenty of due diligence before allowing the current keyholders to become such. I'd argue in a much better fashion than you have done yourself.

I have only one thing to say.... in words of trust MJ is irreplaceable, I would easily send him an amount of BTC knowing they are safe and to be returned when I ask....

If I think trust then I think MJ.

^
Yeah right is right no more to say, no more to add, just why always try to pick on someone thats doing an awesome job and is most contributing to the place....

Then again every place has there NAYsayers

Then we .......

https://i.imgur.com/IMdVfQY.gif

There’s always the potential for anybody theymos chooses to run off with the money. It’s impossible to know people’s circumstances. It doesn’t matter if they bought in 2009-2011 & have millions & millions of USD through bitcoin. A divorce or bad business decisions could lead them to put their hands in the cookie jar, so to speak.

We just have to hope that people police themselves & seemingly very trustworthy people continue to be trustworthy.

I guess I say thank you on behalf of the community to all those who have so far done a great job looking after forum funds & hope that whoever is entrusted in the future does just as good a job as those so far have.

Minerjones has a history of being involved in transactions in which money is missing. The fact that he has successfully completed other transactions does not change this fact. Nor does the fact that coercion was done for lists to be setup in specific ways such that his rating shows as being very high. 

This does not even consider the fact that minerjones has advertised (http://archive.is/LorcG#selection-667.1-546.33) (I am not sure why this thread is in the trashcan, I don't think it should be there) for an obvious ponzi (http://archive.is/6qdPk#selection-559.0-585.34)

I have to commend OgNasty for keeping the BTC safe all these years and proving himself extremely trustworthy.

Regarding this part of the contract:

Is this to be interpreted as a directive the bitcointalk.org domain be given to this organization?

One feature of this forum is there's no order of succession should theymos disappear. The forum's server is controlled by theymos, the forum's funds are controlled by this multisig set up and forum's domain is controlled by me. Should theymos disappear, I really have no idea who to even consider as bitcointalk.org's legitimate leader (even more so if there's widespread disagreement on the topic).

If the treasurers and forum staff are interested, we can collectively sign a contract agreeing on some sort of process to agree on a person to lead the forum should theymos disappear, and pledge to obey and follow that persons instructions in order to avoid splits or multiple organizations/sites claiming to be the real BitcoinTalk. Is that a good idea?

Craig Steven Wright will probably send a claim  :D

On a serious note, I would be surprised if Theymos has never anticipated something like this. The later the better but I learned my lesson and can say the life can dramatically change with a few minutes

It's best to leave it somewhat distributed. It wouldn't be ideal, but it also wouldn't be the end of the world if the forum split into several pieces. And since political processes are ripe for corruption, I prefer to leave these things a bit vague and let all of the involved individuals figure it out to the best of their abilities.

Should I disappear, Cyrus and/or others-I've-established will take over day-to-day operations and decision-making. You and the non-profit organization would act as checks upon them and each other to ensure that the forum doesn't just turn into some business, but would continue to have a "soul".

It's already a Business with you at the helm getting paid Well. If it was not already a business it would have been shut down already.

Thanks. Returning the funds was always the plan. I’m proud to be a treasurer for bitcointalk and congrats to the others chosen for this honor.

OG has escrowed for an obvious ponzi (https://web.archive.org/web/20140429234623/https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=75843.0), what is your point?

EDIT: QS, you should really stop applying double standards when it comes to your unfounded accusations.

I would like to add I think that OG has done a good job as a forum escrow and I believe that he will continue to do so.

Individually, I think these are all good choices for the job. Combined, however, especially minerjones doesn't seem to trust most of the other group members:

• Until less than 20 hours ago, minerjones distrusted (https://loyce.club/trust/2019-05-25_Sat_07.01h/346731.html) theymos (the 20 hours is based on hourly scraping of dtview (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=trust;dtview))
• DarkStar_ is distrusted (https://loyce.club/trust/2019-05-25_Sat_07.01h/507936.html) by minerjones.
• OgNasty is distrusted (https://loyce.club/trust/2019-05-25_Sat_07.01h/18321.html) by minerjones.

Is this intentional, to reduce the risk of collusion?

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What happens to the Bitcointalk.org domain name if Cøbra disappears?

If no highly reputable person is able to re-acquire it, I imagine the forum could continue functioning under a different domain name. It wouldn't be the first time, too.

That would be quite the miracle.

I guess I am late to react but thank you theymos especially a lot of respects and thanks to OgNasty. We are stronger when we are together and this is another act that we are together building a Bitcoin community.

Good job.

I believe that eventually the domain would be auctioned. And everything would continue in the same way, with what really matters: The public ledger.

If it were left to expire, I expect it would be auctioned by a third party (e.g DropCatch). I don't think what he's saying is out of the realms of possibility.

What could be the reasons that Theymos and Cobra may disappear? I read in this thread and in the contract about the word "Disappear (if)"

Dying is a natural thing - what else?


Theymos has control over the server, Cobra has control over the domain if I'm not wrong.
Who else has access to this domain and server in absence of Theymos and Cobra? Shouldn't be there a plan B at least for the natural cause?

Maybe they elope.

I mean, not necessarily together or anything.

No seriously, a lot of early bitcoiners have gone. Maybe they chose to go or The Feds chose for them.

Ask Satoshi Nakamoto ;)
My point is: anything can happen, the word "disappear" covers all possibilities without the need to make a list.

There is a plan B for the server:

Coma, arrest/imprisonment, kidnap, gets lost in a wilderness, disappears into the sunset on their yachts or even floats off on their seastead.

Embezzlement from the forum.

I don't think you can embezzle money from yourself.

lol just stirring the pot

I am new to this whole Treasurer thing. Before reading parts of the thread I had no idea Treasurers existed.

Why on earth would that be the case? Why would multisigs be required if these are donations?

Having treasurers falls down to there not being one person in control of the very large amount of funds. This precaution prevents an unlikely exit scam or lost funds due to death, dissapesrance or other event.

The multisig wallets take care of those same issues in the same fashion by distributing the responsibility.

Donations can still be valuable and need to be protected.

They have existed since 2013 and are there to increase the bus factor, ie. should theymos get hit by a bus, find himself robbed of the bitcoins, or should the money disappear in other ways, there are still treasurers holding a significant sum.

BTW, most of the money isn't from donations which have long since been spent on the development of new forum software (epochtalk), but from ad revenue.

Thank you for the post. It makes more sense now.

I might have missed the announcement so I apologize if it's old news but it looks like OgNasty and minerjones are no longer treasurers:


Edit - just to clarify because the quote makes it look like this happened in 2013: funds moved to a new address in April 2021, the thread was last edited on October 29, 2021.

I was a bit surprised to notice this by the way.

The new treasurers appear to have less controversy around their (business) dealings in the forum. 

One of the former treasurers has a history of not verifying information.

I didn't know that either (even though I recently visited that page, but didn't read everything).

Removing 2 treasurers at a time means there was no redundancy left if they both wouldn't cooperate.

I checked it because OgNasty was recently attacking (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5377816.msg58775955#msg58775955) theymos (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5376081.msg58669652#msg58669652) and minerjones (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5368339.msg58836350#msg58836350) so I figured there must be something going on. He's very childishly transparent like that.

There was an incident with minerjones being very unhappy with some spam not being deleted on the Collectibles board. Not sure about the timeline though. But this kind of loss of trust surely isn't good for this type of multisig setup.

Og's removal is not surprising albeit long overdue.

The multisig address is a 3-of-5 address, with theymos being one of the three.

A new address was created with the public keys of the 5 new treasurers (which is equivalent to theymos, the two treasurers that are remaining, and the two new treasurers). The transaction out of the old address would have been into the new address.

None of the treasurers would necessarily have known in advance that any of the treasurers were being relieved of their duties, or if they could deduct that one or more treasurers were being fired, which of the treasurers were being fired until theymos released the public keys of each of the treasurers.

so the forum holds millions of dollars of BTC and can't implement 2FA? WTAF... ::)

Theymos??

I don't think that's a money thing. Personally, I like using just my password, and I hate how more and more websites make it exceedingly complicated to login.
2FA would also lead to more users losing access to their account.

I think that more accounts are lost or hacked because of the lack of 2FA generally speaking, than lost because someone lost access to their device (there are always backup codes), but it would be nice to see some exact statistical confirmation.
2FA coming 100% in bitcointalk with new forum software :D

Don't forget if you're on a TOR like browser, you can get a piece of code at the end of the URL that overrides the need to endlessly Captcha / click on a blade of grass or a puff of smoke etc. when logging in.  You should be the only one that has access to that unique URL.

Kind of like a lite version of 2FA (kind of)

Maybe the minimum password requirements when creating a new account could be updated to be actually secure at least? IDK, I agree on the lost 2FA thing, I just find it confounding that all that BTC was wasted on software
 that 100% of nobody has any interest in using, obviously.. ::)


Interesting, I didn't know that but then again I don't use TOR, it's slow af for me and I don't see the benefit when most exit nodes are NSA from what I read...

Question, do you still have to pay BTC for using "Evil" IP addresses? If you don't know what i"m talking about then the answer must be no... :D

TOR is made up of several circuits. The exit node doesn't know where the original message came from and who sent it unless the same party also controls the entry node. So in theory, you should be safe if you use ONLY an NSA controlled exit node, but not an NSA entry node.   

For the record: the Captcha bypass code (https://bitcointalk.org/captcha_code.php) works for non-Tor users too, but usually the captcha isn't that bad without Tor.

The exit node may know what you read, but not who and where you are as long as you don't tell them.

Yes. But there's now the possibility to Remove Proxyban (evil fees) - email to get whitelisted for free (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5350260.0) by either convincing me (or someone else) to get whitelisted, or get an established member (like yourself) to vouch for the new user.

A state-level actor could possibly execute a timing attack against a tor user. Also, if a single entity is running enough tor nodes, they will be able to serve as all three nodes in your circuit at least some of the time, and would know who you are (to an extent), and what you are doing.

I guess this shows that the concept of using multisig for treasurers works. I am curious to know what lead to the change.